Altmark incident

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Altmark incident
17:00 o'clock. The Altmark supply ship that fled into the Jøssingfjord before the British attack. (Aerial photo of a British reconnaissance aircraft)
17:00 o'clock. The Altmark supply ship that fled into the Jøssingfjord before the British attack.
(Aerial photo of a British reconnaissance aircraft)
date February 16, 1940
place Jøssingfjord in Dalane
output 299 British prisoners freed
Parties to the conflict

Flag of the United Kingdom (3-5) .svg Great Britain

War Ensign of Germany (1938–1945) .svg Germany

Commander

Naval Ensign of the United Kingdom, svg Philip Vian

Reichsdienstflagge 1935.svg Heinrich Dau

Troop strength
3 destroyers, 1 cruiser 1 tanker ( Altmark )
losses

1 seriously injured

8 dead
5 seriously injured
6 slightly injured

Supply ship Altmark in Jøssingfjord

When Altmark Incident is one on February 16, 1940 during the Second World War conducted Boarding the German supply ship Altmark by Marines of the British destroyer HMS Cossack in the territorial waters of neutral Norway . During the boarding, 299 allied seamen held captive on the Altmark could be freed, who came from the ironclad Admiral Graf Spee , which was sunk off Buenos Aires on December 17, 1939 . The seamen had been captured in the cruiser war of the Spee against allied merchant ships in the South Atlantic and were handed over to the Altmark before the Spee sank. The Allies had known about the transport of the prisoners, but they did not know on which ship it was taking place and where it was supposed to lead. The captain of the Altmark fled with his ship from the Royal Navy from the South Atlantic, first to West Africa, then via Iceland to Northern Norway. He had intended to bring the ship with the prisoners of war by means of the inland route located within Norwegian territorial waters on the Norwegian west coast from approximately Trondheim to the Skagerrak in the south and from there to Germany. The ship underwent several checks by the Norwegian Navy, during which the captain denied the existence of the prisoners hidden on his ship. The prisoners had previously been hidden deep in the ship's hull. After two days, the ship was arrested by a British flotilla led by the Cossack near Egersund when the Altmark had to sail on an outer passage. The access took place within the Norwegian territorial waters in the presence of smaller Norwegian warships against the protest of the Norwegian Navy. Eight German seamen were killed during the liberation. The freed prisoners were taken to Leith (Scotland) by the flotilla .

prehistory

As early as August 1939 - before the start of the war on September 1, 1939 - the Admiral Graf Spee ( Spee for short ) and her supply ship, the Altmark , had already been put into motion. Under the leadership of Captain Heinrich Dau, the Altmark left Wilhelmshaven at the beginning of August , drove across the Atlantic to Port Arthur and filled its tanks with diesel oil. On September 1st, in order to remain undetected on the high seas, she met the armored ship Admiral Graf Spee near Cape Verde to refuel it with diesel oil. On this occasion, the Altmark received two additional automatic cannons, so-called 2 cm Flak 38 . In addition, their team by 20 armed sailors, two radio operators, a purser and was pinch officer strengthened. The Spee disappeared in the direction of shipping lanes in the South Atlantic in order to capture Allied ships from September 26th. The Altmark also moved into the South Atlantic, but in regions that were far from regular shipping. It should go unnoticed in order to be able to support Spee as best as possible. For this purpose, the captain often changed the appearance of the ship by painting over it. During the trip it was given a wrong name and a wrong national flag . At times the Altmark z. B. as a Norwegian ship. On October 9th, the Altmark was spotted by a British plane pretending to be a US tanker named Delmar .

Until the beginning of December 1939, the Altmark met the Spee about two weeks in the middle of the Atlantic . In doing so, she had to take the captured crew members - most of the senior officers remained on the Spee - of the merchant ships sunk by the Spee. Up to then that was 299 people for whom the ship was not prepared. For example, cells had to be set up in the hull and security personnel had to be provided. On December 19, the Altmark received news of the sinking of the Admiral Graf Spee off Montevideo . At the same time, the British Navy learned of the existence of the supply ship with the British prisoners from the officers released in Montevideo. However, the officers could only confirm the fact of the existence of this auxiliary ship to their interrogators. Few had seen it; there was uncertainty about its appearance. They didn't know if she was armed or not. The Royal Navy immediately began an intensive hunt for this mysterious ship in the Atlantic to free the prisoners.

From the South Atlantic to Egersund in Norway

German casualties are brought ashore after the Altmark incident, February 17, 1940
HMS Cossack arrives in Leith with the liberated, February 17, 1940

Captain Dau, who had learned via radio communications from Berlin that the Royal Navy was looking for his ship, hid with his ship in the South Atlantic southwest of Cape Town for a few weeks. When the water on board was running out, Dau decided on January 24th to make the trip to Germany. Because of the British naval superiority and because the Royal Navy controlled the accesses to the North Sea and thus to Germany, the Altmark drove west of the British Isles towards Iceland and then to Northern Norway. From there it should sail 600 nautical miles to southern Norway (around Mandal) under the protection of the inner Norwegian coastal channel formed by offshore islands and Norwegian neutrality - unhindered by the British naval forces patrolling the Atlantic and the North Sea. From there, Dau wanted to cross the Skagerrak, which belongs to the North Sea, with his ship on a dark night in order to get to the protected waters of Denmark. Dau changed the appearance of his ship more often. His ship carried during the Atlantic passage a. a. first the Norwegian flag and the name Haugesund , later it was called Chirippo and carried the American flag.

On February 14, 1940, the Altmark and its prisoners of war entered Norwegian territorial waters north of Trondheim . The weapons were hidden below deck. It was painted with the real name again. The foreign flag was brought down and not the Reich war flag of the Navy, but the Reich service flag was hoisted. The fact that the Altmark was transporting prisoners of war below deck was hidden from the Norwegian authorities. The prisoners were no longer allowed to go on deck and the bull's eye in the area of ​​the prisoner quarters was covered with a cover. According to the military historian Gerhard L. Weinberg , captain Dau had acted in violation of international law by not mentioning the transport of the prisoners and the arming of the Altmark . In 2013, the Norwegian military historian Geirr H. Haarr considered the concealment of the prisoners below deck to be a breach of the rules of neutrality that Norway had enacted on September 1, 1939. Dau therefore had no right to require Norway to pass through neutral Norway. Dau intended to complete the route to southern Norway quickly and on the night of 15/16. To cross the short sea route over the North Sea to Skagen in February and to continue to Germany under the protection of German minefields.

However, the journey was delayed by the Norwegian Navy. On February 14 and 15, the ship was stopped and checked three times by two different Norwegian torpedo boats , the Trygg and the Snøgg , without the inspectors having been informed of the presence of the prisoners of war. Dau only showed the bridge and refused to allow the ship to be inspected further. He pretended that the Altmark was a tanker that brought diesel oil from Port Arthur to Germany in the service of the Navy (according to Dau, a state ship). The captains of the torpedo boats accepted this information. The head of the Second Norwegian Sea Defense Section in Bergen , Rear Admiral Carsten Tank-Nielsen , was not satisfied with that. The ship struck him as strange. He went to Altmark himself on February 15 at 12:30 with the destroyer Garm and stopped it north of Bergen for the fourth time. His emissary again asked Dau to examine the ship carefully. Captain Dau refused again. Instead, he secretly tried to reach the German embassy in Oslo by radio . The telegram was intercepted by Garm . Thereupon the Norwegians accused Dau of having violated the neutrality regulations by using the radio. When Dau apologized, the Norwegians refrained from issuing an official warning. They also pointed out to Dau that they did not accept his theory of a ship in government services. From their point of view, a ship was either a merchant ship or a warship. In the case of a warship, they would have had to authorize the ship to continue its voyage without an inspection, but the Altmark would not have been entitled to sail through the sea area of Bergen krigshavn under the neutrality regulations . In the case of a merchant ship, the Norwegians would have had the right to a full inspection. They could have released the prisoners after their discovery because it was illegal to keep people prisoner on a civilian ship. During this last of the four checks, the Norwegian officers noticed the presence of people below deck who had not been declared by the Germans. Because the prisoners had made a tremendous noise below deck to attract attention.

Despite the false information, Tank-Nielsen refrained from an exact search of the ship, but he canceled the permit to continue to Bergen. Most of Norway's naval ships and facilities were located in Bergen. Tank-Nielsen ordered Captain Dau to drive part of the route north again and then to use the unprotected outer route on the outer coast of Norway to bypass Bergen. That meant a big detour for the Altmark and a danger to the ship, because every delay made the crossing over the Skagerrak more dangerous from Dau's point of view. In addition, it was suspected that British warships were patrolling the outer coast near mountains.

When Tank-Nielsen reported these events to his superior, Admiral These, and also mentioned the presence of prisoners on board the Altmark , the latter did not agree with Tank-Nielsen's decisions. Admiral This also thought the Altmark was a warship . But he thought it best to let her pass to southern Norway as quickly as possible so that she could get out of Norway as quickly as possible - without causing a stir. He consulted with the Foreign Minister, who agreed. After consulting the Foreign Minister, this tank-Nielsen ordered the Altmark to be allowed to pass through the Bergen krigshavn sea ​​area . According to Haarr, this decision was a clear mistake, because the Altmark was a warship. In addition, Dau had lied to the inspectors, claiming that he had no prisoners on board.

Thanks to aerial photographs from a reconnaissance plane, the British had been certain since noon on February 15 that the Altmark was the ship with the prisoners they had been looking for since December 17, 1939. They probably found the ship because of the heavy radio traffic. The 4th Destroyer Flotilla and Captain Philip Vian were scheduled to seize the Altmark on the HMS Cossack . On February 16 at around 2:50 p.m., British aircraft sighted the Altmark within Norwegian territorial waters south of Stavanger.

In the meantime, the Altmark was almost there. The coastal waterway was ended and the Altmark had to travel a short distance in unprotected waters on the west side of Norway to get to the Norwegian south. Dau's route was now one nautical mile south of the outer coast of Norway, but within the three-mile zone that forms the sovereign border . The Altmark was at the time accompanied by two Norwegian torpedo boats. Around 4 p.m. three British Royal Navy warships came into view from the west near Egersund .

The actions of the Royal Navy

These ships were part of the British 4th Destroyer Flotilla, which had been used for several days to raise the Altmark . The destroyers began to pursue the Altmark and penetrated Norwegian territorial waters. With flag and headlight signals, they asked the Altmark to change course to the west in the international fairway outside of Norwegian territory. The Altmark did not react. Then the HMS Ivanhoe (D16) tried to push the Altmark from the coast to the west in the direction of international waters. When that did not succeed, the destroyer HMS Intrepid (D10) fired several warning shots with a cannon in the direction of Altmark . The Altmark stopped and the captain of the destroyer launched a dinghy to board the Altmark . Before the crew of the dinghy could go on board, the Altmark suddenly picked up speed and escaped for the time being. The Norwegian escort boats hindered these English attacks all the time with varying degrees of success. Then Ivanhoe attempted a ship to ship boarding. A crew designated for this took up positions on the side of the ship to jump onto the other ship if possible. The Ivanhoe's captain steered the destroyer closer to the Altmark . When the Ivanhoe was about three feet away, Captain Dau made the Altmark steer a sharp arc to port . In doing so, her propeller current pushed the bow of the Ivanhoe away. That was when entering a small stretch of coast called Jøssingfjord. Dau saved himself and his ship in this fjord at 5:10 p.m. The Jøssingfjord is very small (about 3 km long and narrow) so that it can only accommodate a few ships. The Norwegian escort boats laid themselves across the narrow entrance to the fjord and first on the side of the Altmark to prevent the British from boarding. The British withdrew into the nearby international waters except for the Ivanhoe , which kept watch in front of the fjord entrance. A short time later, the captain of the flotilla, Philip Vian, arrived with the destroyer Cossack and lay down next to the Ivanhoe to exchange information .

The spokesman for the Norwegian escort boats, Lieutenant Halvorsen, visited Vian on the Cossack and they discussed the situation. Halvorsen protested vigorously against the violation of Norway's neutrality by the British ships and warned Vian against a boarding mission in the fjord, as the Norwegian ships would then fire torpedoes at the HMS Cossak. He also threatened at times to attack the British ships with his torpedoes if they had not left the Norwegian sovereign zone within 30 minutes. Meanwhile a torpedo boat had aimed its torpedoes at the Cossack. At around 6:30 p.m. Halvorsen left the Cossack after promising Vian that he would search the Altmark again . Halvorsen contacted his superiors and described the events. However, the Admiralty did not allow the local naval forces to conduct a further investigation of the Altmark . After consulting the Foreign Office, the Admiralty forbade the naval forces and Halvorsen to repel a possible British boarding.

Unable to know, the British ships left Norwegian waters around 6:45 p.m. and lay in wait outside the 3-mile zone. Vian informed the British Admiralty and waited for new instructions. Around this time Vian received the order from Minister of the Navy Winston Churchill personally to board the Altmark and free the prisoners if the Norwegians did not consent to the Altmark in a joint British-Norwegian convoy with a British-Norwegian guard on board to Bergen bring. The Cossack then entered the fjord at 10:45 p.m. At the entrance they were asked to turn around by Halvorsen on his torpedo boat Kjell with a loudspeaker. Vian followed suit and replied over the loudspeaker that he had orders to free 400 Altmark prisoners . Halvorsen replied that these prisoners did not exist - that was what he knew - and that the Norwegian government did not allow an inspection. Vian Halvorsen then suggested - still over the loudspeaker - that a joint Norwegian-British inspection be carried out with Halvorsen's ship Kjell on board the Altmark . Halvorsen refused, citing instructions from his government. In addition, his ship is not able to maneuver in the icy water of the fjord. When Vian Halvorsen suggested observing the maneuver on board the Cossack , he came on board the Cossack . At the same time, the commander of the now four Norwegian naval vessels, Captain Lura von der Fireren , reported the penetration of the British Cossack into the fjord to the Admiralty. The Admiralty again gave the order to protest, but not to use force.

At 11:45 p.m. the Cossack drove further into the fjord, lay down alongside the Altmark and had a raiding party board her. Halvorsen left the Cossack when the boarding party on board the Altmark began to fire. Seven German seamen were killed and one British man was injured. Several German sailors who had jumped overboard in a panic to come ashore across the fjord ice, except for one, were rescued from the icy water. When the British discovered the locked cargo holds of the Altmark , they broke them open. The officer who had led the boarding called into the holds: “Any Englishmen down here?” When that was happily answered in the affirmative, he allegedly called out: “Come up then. The Navy 's' ere. ”The Cossack took the 299 prisoners of war on board and left at 1:00 am to take them to Great Britain . The Germans were left behind to their astonishment. The tanker that ran aground during the boarding maneuver remained in the fjord.

Legal discussions after the incident

The incident caused resentment, albeit short-lived, between Norway and the United Kingdom. Among other things, the Norwegian ambassador Erik Colban protested the very next day, February 17, 1940, at a meeting with the British Foreign Minister Lord Halifax against what they believed to be a serious violation of Norwegian territorial waters. Norway demand that the British bring the prisoners back to Norway. He also called for reparations for Norway.

The British Foreign Secretary Halifax held against it. He complained u. a. emphatically that the Norwegian government has not fulfilled its responsibility as a neutral state by not looking after the prisoners on the Altmark . These should have been released on humanitarian grounds. The Norwegian government would have carried out the searches of the Altmark negligently. Halifax then presented the request to intern the Altmark in Norway. He also argued that the Germans, as the belligerent power, had the right to peaceful passage even with prisoners. However, they were only allowed to pass through Norwegian waters if they had followed a normal course and only switched from one sea area directly to the other. The aim of the Altmark , however, was to continue the war-like operations carried out in the South Atlantic in the autumn of 1939 together with the Admiral Graf Spee during the spring of 1940 under the protection of Norwegian neutrality. The Altmark has chosen an exceptionally long and a very large detour significant route through Norwegian waters, which took several days. The Norwegians did not investigate these violations of the rules of neutrality. Therefore, the British felt they were entitled to carry out the boarding operation and the liberation of the prisoners. Halifax went on to say that he was ready to admit that this case was not a clash of right and wrong, but that two legal conceptions were valid side by side.

The historian Doherty takes up this argument of February 17, 1940 in his essay. Because he sees the Altmark incident characterized by the fact that a legal status existed on all sides of this conflict - with the Germans, the Norwegians and the British.

In the newspaper Stavanger Aftonbladet of February 19, 1940, the Norwegian Foreign Minister Halvdan Koht described the action of the British as the most obvious violation of neutrality that Norway had experienced in the war. However, he also complained that Germany had carried the war into Norway by traveling the Altmark .

consequences

The Jøssingfjord in 2006

The Norwegians were upset that their neutrality had been violated and did not want to be drawn into a European war. In fact, the Altmark incident sowed doubts among the Allies and in Germany about Norwegian neutrality. Both sides had contingency plans for military action against Norway, particularly in relation to the routes of the Swedish iron ore on which the German defense industry depended in the early stages of the war.

The Altmark incident was next to the sinking of the Admiral Graf Spee one of the few successes for the British during the seat war . When Norway was invaded and occupied by the Germans a little later , the Altmark boarding was abused for propaganda purposes. The Germans erected a memorial in Jøssingfjord to commemorate the deed of the "British pirates". The protagonists of the Norwegian collaboration government tried to counter their nickname Quislinge with the derogatory term Jøssing for pro-Allies and opponents of the Germans. Efforts failed as the public immediately saw the word Jøssing as a positive term. For the Norwegians sympathized with the British, who had stood by them against the German invasion and had given refuge to their royal house and the legitimate government. Finally, the word was banned from official usage in 1943.

The Altmark incident prompted Adolf Hitler to accelerate the plans for the occupation of Norway, which Grand Admiral Erich Raeder had called for on several occasions and which had been set in motion on January 24, 1940 with the establishment of a special staff north, later special staff Weser exercise . The Germans realized how quickly neutral Norway could be occupied by the Allies, which would have been disadvantageous for several reasons. On February 19, 1940, Hitler decided to intensify the planning of the Weser Exercise Company , the occupation of Denmark and Norway. On February 21, General Nikolaus von Falkenhorst was appointed head of the special staff. On March 1, 1940, Hitler issued the Weser exercise directive . On April 9, 1940, the occupation of Norway began.

literature

Web links

Commons : Altmark  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Geirr H. Haarr: The Altmark incident . In: Geirr H. Haarr: The Gathering Storm - The Naval War In Europe September 1939 – April 1940. The Naval War in Northern Europe September 1939 – April 1949. Seaforth Publishing, Barnsley 2013, p. 352.
  2. ^ Martin A. Doherty: The attack on the Altmark - A case study in wartime Propaganda online text from Journal of Contemporary History 38/2003, p. 188.
  3. ↑ Geirr H. Haarr: The Altmark incident . In: Geirr H. Haarr: The Gathering Storm - The Naval War In Europe September 1939 – April 1940. The Naval War in Northern Europe September 1939 – April 1949. Seaforth Publishing, Barnsley 2013, pp. 354 and 522.
  4. ↑ Haarr p. 354.
  5. ^ Gerhard L. Weinberg: A world in arms. The story of World War II. DVA, Stuttgart 1995, ISBN 3-421-05000-7 , p. 89.
  6. ↑ Haarr, Barnsley 2013 S. 386th
  7. ↑ a b c Geirr H. Haarr: The Altmark incident . In: Geirr H. Haarr: The Gathering Storm - The Naval War In Europe September 1939 – April 1940. The Naval War in Northern Europe September 1939 – April 1949. Seaforth Publishing Barnsley 2013, p. 387.
  8. ^ Martin A. Doherty: The attack on the Altmark - A case study in wartime Propaganda. P. 189.
  9. ↑ Haarr, Barnsley 2013, pp. 330 and 386.
  10. ↑ a b Geirr H. Haarr: The Gathering Storm - The Naval War In Europe September 1939 to April 1940 . Seaforth Publishing, Barnsley 2013, p. 360.
  11. ↑ Geirr H. Haarr: The Gathering Storm ... Barnsley 2013 S. 386th
  12. ↑ Hans-Martin Ottmer: "Weser Exercise". The German attack on Denmark and Norway in April 1940 . Munich 1994, ISBN 3-486-56092-1 , p. 27.
  13. ↑ Geirr H. Haarr: The Gathering Storm - The Naval War In Europe September 1939 to April 1940 . Seaforth Publishing, Barnsley 2013, p. 369 ff.
  14. ↑ Geirr H. Haarr: The Gathering Storm - The Naval War In Europe September 1939 and April 1940 . Seaforth Publishing, Barnsley 2013, pp. 374-379.
  15. ^ A b Martin A. Doherty: The attack on the Altmark - A case study in wartime Propaganda. P. 192.
  16. ^ Philippe Masson: The German Army. History of the Wehrmacht 1935–45 , Munich 2000, ISBN 3-7766-1933-3 , p. 107.
  17. ^ Klaus A. Maier, Bernd Stegemann: Securing the European northern flank. In: Klaus A. Maier, Horst Rohde, Bernd Stegemann, Hans Umbreit: The German Reich and the Second World War . Volume 2: The establishment of hegemony on the European continent. Published by the Military History Research Office , DVA, Stuttgart 1979, ISBN 3-421-01935-5 , p. 197.

Coordinates: 58 ° 19 ′ 1.3 ″  N , 6 ° 20 ′ 11.1 ″  E